Suburbia
by virtueorwhatever
Summary: Barbecues, junkie parents, PTA meetings, Mommy and Me classes, wasted potential, play dates, Little League and infidelity. Starring Jay and Emma Hogart, Sean and Manny Cameron, and Craig and Ellie Manning
1. Flirt

**Flirt**

Manuela Cameron nee Santos was always going to be a flirt. It was evident by her lower than low cut shirts showing the perky tops of her breasts, her skirts that if she bent down, she could be arrested for indecent exposure and the pounds of makeup she would decorate her twenty five year old skin with. But there wasn't just physical proof of her being a tease. Her personality was the most attracting to men.

The way she batted her thick eyelashes while complimenting complete slobs like Spinner Mason in that breathy voice that drove men crazy, the way she swayed her hips with utter confidence wherever she went that ended up transfixing Craig Manning, even the grocery store, the way that she was like a light and the men were moths is why Manny had a gift. She could have any man she wanted, whenever she wanted him.

But when did it become a curse? Manny knew she was approaching her thirtieth birthday and then soon after that, she would be forty. She could feel herself getting older and age meant losing her beauty. What would become of her without her looks? She shuddered thinking of it.

Manny woke up at one p.m., her typical wakeup time. She arose from her Egyptian cotton sheets and picked up her silk robe and walked over to her mirror and began brushing her thick black hip length hair. She then decided to take a nice long shower before she got dressed. Manny had discovered when she was fourteen that one of the few things that comforted her was a nice scalding hot shower. She could think and attempt to solve her problems and wash away her impurities and sins at the same time.

She dried off and put her silk robe back on before going over to the French door windows and opening all of them. She was pleased to see that the sun was out and she felt no breeze so she decided to tan; her favorite thing to do that didn't involve money. She put on a white bikini and white strappy heels and placed her favorite Chanel sunglasses on top of her head. She was heading down the stairs to the spacious backyard when she noticed a blinking red light on the answering machine located on the coffee table by the bottom of the stairs.

She rolled her eyes and tapped her French tip acrylic nails on the banister as she decided whether or not to listen to the messages. She sighed and jabbed her finger on the play button and braced herself for the stupidity.

"Hey baby, it's me. I tried waking you up this morning but you looked so peaceful I decided not to bother you. Its twelve o clock now and I'll be at the house by two thirty for the barbecue today. Okay? I love you baby."

She suppressed her gag reflex due to her disgust at hearing her husband's voice. A barbecue? Jesus Christ, what the fuck did she look like? Did he mistake her for perfect little Emma Hogart with her three little brats running around and her social luncheons and barbecues? There was a reason why her and Sean didn't have kids. Manny refused to be controlled by children and quite frankly, with their dirty sticky hands and the amount of attention they required, she was sickened by the notion of reproducing.

Try telling that to Sean Cameron, she thought bitterly. Sean refused to grasp the fact she wasn't about to ever bear his child, now or ever. It was always him getting on her ass about children. "When are we gonna have that football player?" he'd beg her. And she would smile coyly and say "Soon baby." Motherhood was not a role she was ready for or ever be ready for.

She pulled her hair out of her bun and shook it loose on her shoulders. She trudged up the stairs in her heels, hoping to ruin the wood varnish that Sean tried so fiercely to protect. She put on more makeup, threw a white lacy dress over her white bikini, slathered lotion onto her bronze skin, and by the time, she finished putting the final touches onto her appearance; she heard the front door slam and Sean rush up the stairs.

She looked into her mirror and pouted. Sean was the last person she wanted to see. All she wanted to do today was to lay out, tan and sleep. But instead, she was roped into going becoming little Miss June Cleaver housewife and going to go put on a show for the neighbors. Oh yes, everything with her and Sean are great! Babies? Oh yes, very very soon!

Her stomach dropped, just thinking about doing that. She wanted adventure, scandal, sex, sin and this whole suburbia gig Sean seemed to be so obsessed with wasn't cutting it.

"Manny!"

She turned around, wincing as she saw her husband boyishly grinning in the doorway with his longish curly blond hair in his eyes.

"Come on baby, the barbecue is in a half hour and we have still have to pick up something from the bakery!" Sean gestured for her to hurry.

Manny put on a fresh coat of lip-gloss, grabbed her white sunglasses and resigned herself to the bullshit she would soon have to spew. As she buckled herself in their Mercury Mariner and Sean started not only the car, but babbling on and on about how great is that Jay and Emma decided to throw this barbecue and how good their children are doing. Manny laughed. Like she gave a fuck.


	2. Junk

**Junk**

Craig Manning woke up and was immediately disgusted. Disgusted by his fiending urge to go into the drawer of the nightstand next to him and take out his next fix, disgusted by the sleeping redhead next to him and all of her drama and shit that drove him to his next fix faster than anyone or anything else. He lay back in bed shirtless as he tried to stall before he let his mind give into his body's screams for more.

He reached for his pack of cigarettes and took one out and stuck it in his mouth. He pulled the covers off of him, slowly and prayed he wouldn't wake up his wife as he got out of bed. He lit the cigarette and exhaled deeply, relishing the burning in his lungs. The sudden rushes of nicotine to his brain momentarily hushed the withdrawal symptoms he dreaded every morning. He made his way over to the adjoining bathroom and took a good look in the mirror.

He was, for the second time that morning, disgusted. He examined his pale bony physique and lamented the lack of meat on his body and shuddered at his face. There was no fat on his fat; not even enough to look healthy. His skin stretched over his face and created a look that was eerily skeletal.

He tried to remember the last time his body craved food as much as it craved the dope he greedily poured into his veins and he couldn't remember. He couldn't remember the last time he felt hunger. Actual hunger not hunger for the next fix. He laughed at how fucked up that was and inhaled another lengthy drag of his cigarette.

He pulled on a pair of pajama pants and went down the hall to find the one solace in his life. The one thing he truly cared about. Alice. He smiled as he thought about his daughter. As much as the thought of that whore Ellie made his violently ill and brought back all the memories of his mental illness at it's peak; he loved Ellie for providing him with the most beautiful thing in the world. Four years ago, when he first started doing dope and before Ellie even touched the stuff was when Alice had entered his world and completely turned it upside down.

Sometimes when he lay in bed at night when Ellie was passed out and he was coming down from his last fix, he toyed with the idea of becoming clean. God knows, what all these drugs and dysfunction was doing to Alice. Maybe he wasn't beating her physically but by being strung out all the time; he was beating her emotionally. But then the drugs called his name and he was in love with them. And when if there ever was a contest between Alice and heroin; he was completely wrecked to admit that Alice wouldn't win.

He turned the knob in his daughter's room and found his mother-in-law and Alice on the floor watching television. Some stupid Disney Channel shit that he knew his daughter loved and the evidence was written all over her face as she smiled and giggled at the antics of the show. He smiled at her joy and his whole body untensed. It was the Alice effect; he thought smiling. Almost better than any drug. He frowned when he realized what he thought. _Almost._

His mother-in-law jerked her head abruptly and saw her dirty junkie son-in-law looking like death standing in the doorway smoking a cigarette and frowned as she noticed the ashes were falling over the pink plush carpet.

"Craig," she addressed him firmly but not as firmly as she wished she could. She still had a four year old granddaughter to protect from her strung out parents.

Craig snapped out of his trance and looked at his mother-in-law. He knew he was in for a lashing.

"Yes?" he asked as innocently as he could.

"I have asked you a thousand times not to smoke near Ali's room. Haven't I?" She said sweetly.

Craig glanced down at the cigarette in his left hand and at the pile of ashes on the floor.

"Sorry, I forgot. I just wanted to get Alice up and ready for school." He shrugged. Craig prayed she wouldn't start with him. Not here and not now.

"It's Saturday." She replied coldly.

A wave of self resentment washed over him. How the fuck could he not know what day it was? He was mentally kicking himself in the head when he noticed Alice was dressed in a yellow summer dress and her red hair was scooped into two neat pigtails held into place by two yellow barrettes.

"Um why is Alice all dressed up?" He asked, raking his hand through his dirty dark curls.

"We have a barbecue to go to today, Craig. Don't you remember? Your friends? The Hogarts? In fact, we're leaving in twenty minutes. I would have woken you and Ellie up but I didn't want to disturb you or anything you were doing."

The last sentence was said with such discontent and disgust that it only fueled the fire of self resentment that had been growing all morning.

He knew he was a junkie fuckup married to another junkie fuckup but to be reminded by his mother-in-law in front of his four year old daughter was another story.

"I'll get Ellie up and we'll be downstairs in ten minutes." He said, trying to smile and pretend like he couldn't sense the disappointment in her demeanor.

"Okay, Craig." He didn't have to face her to know she rolled her eyes.

He practically sprinted to his room and burst through the door to find Ellie dressed in a black summer dress, black heels with her stringy hair loose and on her shoulders. She started to lean over her dressing table and inhale the white lines in her nose. She wiped her nose and sniffed heavily. She turned and smiled.

"Hey babe. I thought we might need a little bit of this to wake us up after last night's party." She laughed and tossed her hair.

He looked at her. She attempted to hide the dark circles under her eyes with makeup and she didn't look any better. Or cleaner. He wondered silently if she showered.

"Babe?"

He looked into her big hazel eyes that were staring up at his with deep questioning and he tried desperately to search for any of the life and principles that he fell in love with were still there. Her eyes were dead. Completely glazed over and dead. The drugs had taken all of her quirky cynical idealism and turned it into nothing. She was nothing now.

He slowly stepped away from her, cringing as he saw her bend her head over one line after the other. The urge, the need, the screams for his fix grew louder and louder. He felt himself become nauseous. He yanked off his pajama pants and pulled on a pair of jeans; not caring if they were clean or dirty. He thrust his closet doors open and yanked on a Jethro Tull shirt and a leather jacket. His standard uniform.

He went into his special drawer after yanking on a pair of shoes and locating his rock star sunglasses. He looked at his needle, all pointy and metallic. He examined the liquid inside, clear, poisonous and life giving. He located the vein he usually shot up and closed his eyes as he injected himself. His pupils dilated and all of sudden, he was at peace. He could think easily in a syrupy flowing motion. Thoughts were no longer separate fragments but winded together in one fluid movement of his brain.

Alicemusicellierecordcompanyfansgigsconcertscokespeedheroininjectmoremoremoremoremorealice

The only thing he could hear when he got into the car that his annoying mother-in-law insisted on driving was Alice's preschool babble. He smiled as she babbled on and on about the puppies she saw on television. He couldn't hear Ellie's nasal nagging or her mother noisily grind her teeth. It was happiness.


	3. Bored

**Bored**

Emma Nelson never imagined herself a housewife. She wasn't cut out for it with all her ideals on feminism and women empowerment. She only saw herself in a high stress job where she was calling the shots and making an impact on the world. Well look at her now. She was twenty five years old, married since she was eighteen, and she had three children all under the age of five. She was royally fucked if she ever decided to attempt to leave.

Not that she would. She enjoyed her life. She loved her children with all of her heart and had no problem staying home in order to tend to them. She just resented them a bit for becoming her world. Her own mother proved to her that children, although a large part of their mother's life, do not have to become their everything. Mothers deserved to have lives outside their children and Emma always swore to herself she would uphold that philosophy.

Emma rubbed her temples to relieve some stress and went back to icing the red velvet cake her husband begged her to make for the barbecue he asked her to throw. Speaking of her husband, she wondered where he was. If he was asleep, she'd fucking kill him; she thought angrily as she finished icing the cake. She placed the cake gently in the refrigerator and went to her living room to seek out her husband.

She found him there, dressed in baggy shorts and a black shirt over a jacket. A black fitted hat that was formerly on his head was now perched on top of her three year old son as he giggled and played with his father. All resentment and pure frustration with Jay was gone as she watched her son play and giggle. Just by looking at the two of them, anybody can tell that little Jason was completely enraptured with his father.

Emma smiled as she thought about her son and his identical resemblance to his father. The same pouty lips, the same blue eyes with the sneaky gleam, and the same brown hair that Jason had recently decided looked better with a hat on top of it. It wasn't just physical. He was as charming, clever, and confident as his father. He even smirked the same. Emma could tell that once Jason got older, she'd be in a constant state of worry about her son.

"Hey babe."

"Hey." Emma sighed.

"Are you okay?" Jay had Jason on his shoulders and Emma could feel both sets of blue eyes looking at her quizzically.

Emma nodded. "Just a little stressed. I see you two are having a good time."

"Yes!" Jason grinned.

Jay smirked. "I'm just showing little Jay Jay how to fight. Wanna see?"

He placed the toddler in front of him and pointed to his cheek. Jason gave him a right hook to the face the best a three year old boy could. Jay pretended to be immense pain, rolling on the floor.

"See, Em! Check out that right hook. We got a little Ali for a son." Jay said, scooping Jason into his arms.

Emma smiled and knew her old anti-violence crusader self would be outraged and disgusted by the father of her son teaching him violence at such a young age but now she realized Jay was always going to be a somewhat violent sneaky man with the inclination to never do the right thing. Marriage and fatherhood had mellowed him out but not by a great deal. He would still push if pushed and fuck someone up if fucked with.

"Very nice Jay Jay. Now where are Callum and Adele?" She asked, crossing her arms.

"I have no idea. They said they wanted to pay hide and seek and that little Jay Jay was too young to play so I stayed here with him. You aren't gonna get pissy, right? Cause I don't think I have the patience for another Emma bitchout. Seriously, fucking save it if you're gonna bitch and moan." Jay hissed; his blue eyes clouding with annoyance. He had his hands over Jason's ears in order to protect his son from his tone and language.

"Um no, Jay. I wasn't going to bitch and moan but sorry if I ask you to watch the damn children, I expect you to know where all three of them are!"

She stomped out of the room, leaving him to kick a wall and curse at her. She could faintly hear him shout "Goddamnit Emma!"

She opened the sliding door from her kitchen to her backyard where she quickly spotted her two oldest children. They were squatted over a dead slug where they were both armed with pointy sticks that she watched them continually jab at the slug.

"Callum! Adele! What do you think you are doing? This is playing hide and seek?!"

The two children dropped their sticks as their mother ran over to them.

"Mommy, it was Callum's idea!"

"No! Adele said it would be fun!"

Emma looked down at their guilty faces. She didn't know whether to chalk it up to childhood curiosity or make a big environmental deal out of it. Then she remembered the miracle that her twins were. Her pregnancy was not an easy one and the twins ended up being born eight weeks premature. It was insane that they even made it through, let alone with no disabilities or problems.

"Relax. No one's in trouble. Just go inside and play with Daddy and Jay Jay."

"Kay, Mommy."

She plunked down in a patio chair next to their in ground pool and put her feet up in an attempt to relax. She thought about how her twins were. Adele had her mother's honey blonde hair and facial structure but her father's eyes and lips. Callum had his father's face with his mother's hair color. Emma prayed his hair wouldn't darken to Jay's shade of brown. It was bad enough to have one son be the spitting image of his father but two would be mindboggling.

She glanced down at the expensive watch on her wrist and swore when she saw the time. The barbecue was in ten minutes and she would have to float around and be a good host, mother and wife all at the same time. Emma didn't know if she was ready and wished silently she had thought about that seven years ago.


	4. Asshole

**Asshole**

Jay Hogart lived the good life. He had money, cars, a sexy wife who gave it up whenever he wanted, and three beautiful children. He did whatever he wanted no matter what Emma wanted. What could she expect? Old habits die hard; he thought as he lit a blunt in his garage. He got a secret thrill, knowing that while Emma was busy playing host to a few friends, he was blazing it up in their garage. He laughed as he took a long sweet hit of his fat blunt. Like he gave a shit what those people would think. Their so called friends were either junkies or a well known whore and her husband.

Great people to have around their children. He looked in the mirror and smirked as he took notice of his bloodshot eyes and droopy eyelids. He looked fucked up and he knew that would get Em going. And quite frankly, he could give a shit what Emma said or did. He ran shit; not her. She could fool herself and think she was a happy housewife but he knew the truth. He knew she was just as messed up as the people they were currently entertaining. He knew she regretted getting married so early and popping out kids so early and he knew especially that she lamented her "wasted potential" everyday. He laughed when he thought of her potential.

Did she really think she had potential? After almost getting shot and getting an STD at fifteen, all her potential went down the shitter. He also knew that she'd never leave him. The pure animal like attraction that kept them together was too strong to ever die out. All the arguments and empty threats meant shit when they were in the bedroom. He felt himself get turned on when he thought of the sweaty sticky sex he shared with Emma. And the thought of their makeup sex was enough to make his eyes roll back.

He smiled as he clipped his blunt and stuck it in the pocket of his baggy jeans. He looked in the mirror one more time and smiled. He had been working out to relieve stress at Em's suggestion and now he was built and cut quite unlike the way he was when he was in high school. He adjusted his black fitted hat and straightened out the creases in his black shirt. He looked down at his perfectly white Nikes and did a flex in the mirror until he satisfied. Showtime, he thought, smirking.

He walked out of the side door of the garage that led to the backyard and the first thing that came at him was a hyper little boy clinging to his leg.

"Daddy!" His three year old cried out.

Jay smiled and scooped him up into his arms. He loved his son more than anything in the world. And Jason Jr. was exactly like him. Jay could sense that as he grew up, the similarities would emerge even more.

"What's good, little buddy?"

"Mommy is busy and Adele, Callum and Alice don't wanna play cause they're meanies. Daddy, do you wanna play?" Jay Jay looked up into his father's eyes.

Jay looked into his son's eyes and smiled. His children were the only people to invoke feelings of redemption in him. He wanted to be a better man to set a better example for his children. He could actually understand Emma's whiny bitching about being a better person when his kids pulled on his heartstrings by showing him how much they truly loved him.

"Hell yeah, I'll play with you." With one swift motion, he walked over to the pool where Adele, Callum and Alice were swimming and tossed Jay Jay in.

His son giggled as he came up from the water.

"Again Daddy! Again!"

"Daddy throw me in!"

"No throw me in!"

Jay smirked.

"Sorry that was only for Jay Jay. You guys are too old to be thrown in, right?"

"No! We're not too old!" They protested.

Jay pretended to sigh.

"Okay fine."

All three children jumped out of the pool and Jay proceeded to throw them in. He didn't notice Emma frowning and walk over to him until he felt a tap on the shoulder.

"Jay, what the hell do you think you're doing?" Emma hissed between her teeth.

Jay looked at her before responding. Her long blonde hair was in luxurious waves that cascaded down her tan shoulders and reached her elbows. The dress she was wearing was paper thin and made of a slippery material that he had an urge to touch. Even with her face pouting and her hands on her slim hips, she looked beautiful. Like the same seventeen year old girl he fell in love with.

"I'm just throwing the kids in the pool, Em. Nothing to bug out." He responded while adjusting the fitted that lay upon his head.

"Well when one of them gets hurt; you're driving them to the hospital. Can't you be responsible for two seconds?"

"Emma, relax. It's a barbecue. Kids are supposed to have fun. Be grateful I taught them to swim."

Jay saw Emma crack a small smile before regaining her composure. He smiled. This was his chance.

He put his arms around her waist and kissed her cheek.

"Just relax baby. Later you and I will have our own fun. I'll run the Jacuzzi bath, put some of those fruity bath salts you like so much and give you a nice massage. Crack open a bottle of wine? Maybe work on baby number four?" He teased.

He felt her relax against his arms and become comfortable. She looked into his eyes with her big brown puppy dog eyes.

"Promise?" Emma asked, smiling.

"Promise." He kissed her on the cheek again. "Now if you excuse me I need a chat with my best friends in the whole world."

"Be nice, Jay!" She warned.

Jay laughed. Of' course he'd be nice.


End file.
